Ruth Davidson has said Nicola Sturgeon’s case for a second independence referendum have been “utterly shredded” after the SNP fell short of another majority in the Scottish Parliament election and the Tories remarkably forced Labour into third place.

The Scottish Conservative leader said Ms Sturgeon – who announced she planned to lead a minority administration - had “no mandate, no majority, no cause” to demand a rerun in the next five years and challenged her to rule out another vote.

Ms Davidson recalled how when she stood to become Scottish Tory leader in 2011 the role was compared with “resuscitating a corpse.” However, her party yesterday more than doubled its number of MSPs to 31, with Labour trailing on 24, a drop of 13.

David Cameron expressed his amazement at the result, which he said was a “re-alignment in Scottish politics” that would benefit a strong UK. He said that if someone had predicted the result six years ago “I would have told them to go away, lie down, to stop taking whatever they were taking, and come back and tell me what they really think.”

A disappointed Ms Sturgeon issued a brief statement outside her Bute House residence in Edinburgh without taking questions from journalists. She said the SNP’s 63 seats, two short of a majority and six fewer than Alex Salmond’s winning total in 2011, represented a “clear and unequivocal mandate”.

But the shock result saw bookmakers Ladbrokes immediately lengthen their odds on a vote for separation before 2020 from 4/1 to 10/1. Ms Davidson pulled off the sensational result after convincing thousands of Unionist voters to switch support from the other parties.

She put standing up to the SNP and defending Scotland’s place in the UK at the centre of her campaign, while Labour unsuccessfully attempted to woo Yes and No supporters by claiming the constitutional argument was settled.

But Ms Davidson said: "Now that she has failed to win a majority, whatever claims the SNP were pursuing with regard to constitutional brinkmanship over the next five years have now been utterly shredded.

"No mandate, no majority, no cause - the SNP must now let Scotland move on. There has been a material change.”

The pro-independence Scottish Greens won six seats, meaning there is still majority support for separation in the Holyrood chamber, but Ms Davidson said Ms Sturgeon had “had the legs cut away from under her”.

David Cameron was delighted with the Tories' breakthrough in ScotlandCredit:
AFP

The Prime Minister earlier congratulated Ms Davidson on the "historic result", saying she would "stand up to the SNP and give Scotland strong opposition". The Scottish Tories’ previous best result in a Holyrood election was the 18 MSPs they won in 1999 and 2003.

The Conservative vote was drastically up across Scotland, with the Tories pushing Labour into third place even in many seats they did not win. They also drastically cut the majorities of a series of Nationalist big-hitters such as John Swinney in Perthshire North.

Among the most spectacular successes of the night were Ms Davidson coming from fourth place to win Edinburgh Central and Jackson Carlaw, her deputy, winning back the former Tory stronghold of Eastwood in East Renfrewshire in a three-way fight.

Gemma Doyle, a former Labour MP, said the anti-Semitism row that has engulfed Labour “almost certainly” cost the party the seat, which contains almost half of Scotland’s Jewish population.

Elsewhere, Oliver Mundell, the son of Scottish Secretary David Mundell, won the Labour seat of Dumfriesshire in the face of strong opposition from the SNP. In an unexpected shock, they also took the SNP seat of Aberdeenshire West with a 17 per cent swing.

The Tories won four more constituencies than in 2011 after polling more than half a million votes, then got 24 seats on the regional list – double their previous tally.

These are allocated using a form of proportional representation. Although the SNP won six more constituencies than five years ago, they lost 12 on the list.

Senior Tory strategists said they had been successful in attracting voters who had backed the SNP in 2011 on the grounds of competence, aspirational professionals in their 40s for whom the referendum was a “wake-up call” and those women who do not like Ms Sturgeon.

Willie Rennie, the Scottish Liberal Democrat leader, won North East Fife from the Nationalists. He said the SNP must pledge to take another independence referendum within the duration of the parliament "off the table" if it wants the support of his five MSPs, the same number he had in the last parliament.

Nicola Sturgeon made a brief statement outside Bute HouseCredit:
AFP

Ms Sturgeon said the election result was “emphatic” and she would not seek “any formal arrangement with any other party”, instead working with the opposition to find “common ground” on a case-by-case basis.

She promised to “rise above party politics” and govern for all Scots but did not rule out a second independence referendum, instead asking that the other parties “respect the opinion of the people.”

However, her claim that a second referendum could be triggered by opinion polls showing support for separation was further undermined by the fact that the pollsters’ predictions for yesterday’s result were well wide of the mark.